<p>I know Berkeley is a good school, but I don't think its better than CIT, Oxford, Cambridge, Yale, Princeton, MIT, and Stanford. Somebody at The Times must have some type of strange affection for that school..</p>
<p>You have been reading US News too much thats all.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I am extremely skeptical that the quality of a university - any more than the quality of a magazine - can be measured statistically. However, even if it can, the producers of the U.S. News rankings remain far from discovering the method. Let me offer as prima facie evidence two great public universities: the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor and the University of California-Berkeley. These clearly are among the very best universities in America - one could make a strong argument for either in the top half-dozen. Yet, in the last three years, the U.S. News formula has assigned them ranks that lead many readers to infer that they are second rate: Michigan 21-24-24, and Berkeley 23-26-27
[/quote]
-Gerhard Casper, Former President of Stanford University
<a href="http://www.stanford.edu/dept/pres-provost/president/speeches/961206gcfallow.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.stanford.edu/dept/pres-provost/president/speeches/961206gcfallow.html</a></p>
<p>The 2 world rankings that you've probably come across (one by a Chinese university, the other by a London newspaper) rank GRADUTE programs. Though I personally disagree that Berkeley should be #2 in the world, I do believe that its quality (as well as name recognition and prestige internatioanlly) is part of the "HYPSM" of graduate schools.</p>
<p>Kfc4u, read the criteria, there is no mention of just grad school. Why would they count teacher to student ratio in grad school. And a big part of the TThes was based on prestige. You don't seperate grad and undergrad in prestige ranking. And I assume then that you don't think Harvard should be ranked #1?</p>
<p>I think Oxford should be #1 for global prestige.</p>
<p>UC Berkeley has more departments ranked in the top 10 in their respective fields than any other university in the country.</p>
<p>GentlemanandScholar,</p>
<p>i should've been more clear. the rankings include graduate schools (i.e UCSF), and when it comes to graduate programs, berkeley is top notch. </p>
<p>"I think Oxford should be #1 for global prestige."</p>
<p>depends what part of the world you're in. hegemony plays a role in this. few in the US think oxford is #1 for global prestige, but if you go to british commonwealth nations, they'll make a stronger argument for your case.</p>
<p>"UC Berkeley has more departments ranked in the top 10 in their respective fields than any other university in the country."</p>
<p>Except Stanford</p>
<p>gourmet simply compiled a list of the school's departmental rankings (based on USNews I think) and gave them points for top 5, top 10, etc.</p>
<p>Here's some of the reasons: Berkeley faculty is extraordinary at every level - the best scholars want to live in the area, research accomplishiments - access to research opportuntunities at the undergrad level, number of Nobel laureates and MacArthur recipients. International ambiance, great food, Combine this with physical beauty (campus, redwoods, ocean etc) and access to the SF area. Much more open and creative intellectually than Oxford - not preppy more inclusive.</p>
<p>because berkeley has a very good grad school and most rankings take that into evaluation when ranking "top universities" since all universities have some sort of a grad school. </p>
<p>"UC Berkeley has more departments ranked in the top 10 in their respective fields than any other university in the country"</p>
<p>for grad school yes</p>
<p>I don't exactly believe in college rankings. you can't be be very sure if the rank 2 college is better than rank 3, i feel that we should just look at the rankings to judge if a particular school is 1st,2nd, or third TIER school, and get an approx rank of a school.</p>
<p>I think people should look at the criteria of the rankings and how everything is weighted. It funny, if you read some of the comments in this thread you get people say things like, "the guys in london must just really like berkeley." The people working at the newspaper aren't just arbitrarally choosing which schools they like best, they created a formula that they believe best asses a school's quality and then plugged the schools into the formula. Also, I've never heard anyone complain about Harvard being number one on that list. If they're wrong on Berkeley then they are wrong on Harvard too, because they're using the same criteria.</p>
<p>"I know Berkeley is a good school, but I don't think its better than CIT, Oxford, Cambridge, Yale, Princeton, MIT, and Stanford. Somebody at The Times must have some type of strange affection for that school."</p>
<p>What would qualify you (or anyone else) to know one way or another? Did you attend all of them? In all the departments? In graduate school? (Have you even been within 5,000 miles of Cambridge?)</p>
<p>Most studies of this type at least put forth their methodology. You can disagree with the methodology (and hence question the conclusions) if you choose, but what's yours?</p>
<p>I can never hear enough about how Berkeley is underfunded and overpopulated. That's why my cousin, who lives fairly close to Berkeley, is picking UCLA over it.</p>
<p>Yeah, UCLA is a regular LAC compared to Cal.</p>
<p>That list is based on world-wide prestige.</p>
<p>World wide prestige = Graduate programs, # of publications, science and engineering (since they are universal unlike hummanities), and how extroverted the university is.</p>
<p>Class size and undergraduate has nothing to do with it.</p>
<p>Please show show me the quote that says it doesn't have anything to do with undergrad.</p>
<p>It's mainly graduate schools and the quality of research coming out of the school that creates the rankings and prestige. That's why you're seeing top-notch graduate schools like UCSF and UT-Austin ranked so high and undergrad heavy schools like Dartmouth, Amherst, Williams, etc. all either not ranked or ranked comparatively low.</p>
<p>Again, please give me a quote from these two rankings that say that undergraduate is not considered, because as much as I trust you, I'd like to see some proof.</p>